A recent issue of Private Eye (No. 1404) has an interesting comment about cutbacks in English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) courses. The article takes up a point made by the Prime Minister at his party conference. “There are parts of Britain today where you can get by without ever speaking English or meeting anyone from another culture,” he
Thus ran the Daily Telegraph’s headline (October 19) over an article by Peter Tait, former headmaster of Sherborne School. The article contained all the usual “mom and apple pie” arguments on why our children should be learning foreign languages: “You can never understand one language until you understand at least two”. Well, hurrah for that little gem. The paper reported
The good news is that Saga Norén will be back on the beat in November, complete with leather trousers and the vintage green Porsche. The Bridge is returning for its third series, and aficionados throughout the country will be busy re-arranging their Saturday dinner parties and taking the phone off the hook. So who is Saga? She is a top cop, a brilliant and
A fascinating story in the Sunday Times (October 25 2015). From the Norman Conquest to the 15C the language of the English court and the nobility was of course French. Not too many people are aware of this, possibly due to the way they teach history these days but it was a fact that English was definitely the language of
